Panto
by irishhair
Summary: Vince has never heard the story of Cinderella. After some cajoling, Howard takes him to see the local production of the Panto. Vince isn't sure why Cinderella has to be with the prince though. What's wrong with ending up with your best mate? Howince
1. Chapter 1

It was easy to forget that Vince had been raised in the forest these days. He never stopped to speak

to animals any more, or told stories about Bryan Ferry and his childhood adventures. He had lost

the slightly naïve wonder he used to regard the whole world with. Now he smirked and swaggered

(well, minced really) with an arrogant grace, that was completely divorced from the awkwardly

gangly teenager Howard had lured away from the vacuum that was state education with promises of

adventure and millet rotas.

Howard was shocked then, to discover that Vince had never heard of Cinderella. Later he realised

that there was no logical way that he would have known. Leopards are not known for their

knowledge of the collected works of the Grimm's Brothers and Bryan was more the lullaby than

the bed time story type.

"Howard," Vince bounded up excitedly

"What?" Howard muttered barely looking up from his copy of Global Explorer

"Can we see this?" he held up a poster, "It looks well trendy. It's about a girl who gets made a

princess because she had great shoes. Imagine that!"

Howard looked more carefully at the poster.

"Vince, this is for the panto. It's for kids," he said flatly, "Besides you already know what happens

in the end, so what's the point paying twenty quid to see some sad collection out of work soap actor

and and has-been pop stars torture us with two hours of double entendres and dodgy slapstick?"

"Why what happens? Does she win X-factor?" Vince asked with sincerity shining from his eyes.

Howard eyed him suspiciously.

"Are you trying to say that you never heard the story of Cinderella?" he asked incredulously, "You

know the words to every Gary Numan song ever written and you don't know what happens at the

end of Cinderella?"

"Yeah," said Vince churlishly, "So are we going or what?"

"I'll book the tickets," Howard sighed.

He had forgotten how loud it was. Even as a child he had found it all very unnecessary and tedious.

It was worth it though, to see Vince staring at the play wide-eyed, whooping for the good guys and

hissing at the bad guys. Howard had been ready to tackle any and all questions about girls playing

boys and middle aged men playing old women, with historical background notes on the theatre

prepared in bullet points, but Vince had taken it all in his stride. Typical. At the moment he was

admiring the actress who played Button's tight knee length trousers.

"Those are genius! Do you think that the Victorian butler look could be coming back?" he asked in

Howard's general direction. Howard chose to see this as a rhetorical question, as Vince would

hardly ask him his opinion on fashion trends in dead earnest.

During the interval, Vince bought a bag of liquorish all sorts "to share" (translation: he ate them and

picked out the plain black ones for Howard)

"Thanks for taking me Howard," he said with his cheeks full of sweets, looking more childlike than

he had in years. His free hand rested on Howard's armrest, his long fingers plucking at the worn nap

of the velvet.

The lights dimmed and the curtains reopened. The second act was beginning. Vince impulsively

grabbed Howard's hand and rested his head on his friend's shoulder. Ooh that's low, thought

Howard, wait until I can't make a fuss. It didn't actually bother him very much really. But it did

worry him that it didn't. He nervously reached out an arm and placed it self consciously around

Vince.


	2. Chapter 2

Vince was quieter during the second act, not heckling the dumber heckers any more or throwing all-sorts at the people in the stacks. He just sat slumped against Howard's shoulder and fiddling with a loose thread on his sleeve.

Howard sat as stiff as a board with his arm mechanically around his friend's waist, trying so hard to be nonchalant. Vince shifted and his cheek came into contact with Howard's neck. Howard flinched slightly, but tightened his grip on Vince. He spent the rest of the performance focusing solely on Vince's hot breath against his throat.

When the curtain finally fell after three curtain calls (three too many, thought Howard) they rose to their feet awkwardly. Howard shifted away from Vince and looked steadfastly at the ground but, made no move to take his arm away. They walked towards the exit holding on to each other loosely but closely, bumping hips and legs together occasionally.

I missed this, Howard realised abruptly. Doing stupid things with Vince that neither of them would ever normally do. Vince touching him. He told Vince not to touch him so man times that apparently he'd stopped trying.

"What I don't understand is," Vince said tiredly, "why did Cinderella marry the prince?"

"Fitted the shoe. If the shoe fits, wear it," Howard replied

"No, I mean why did she want to marry him not how did she manage it. And I'm not even going to go into how unlikely it is that one person would have a different shoe size to everyone else in the country and still be able to find fab shoes"

"Why wouldn't she marry him? He's the prince. That's how stories go"

"But what about Buttons?" Vince insisted. How did bloody chocolate come into it? "Buttons loved her and she liked him better than anyone else she knew. Why does she drop him?" Oh that Buttons.

"Button's being in love with Cinderella is supposed to be a joke. She didn't see him like that even as a possibility," Honestly a footman who was a very ineffectively disguised girl over the heir to the thrown?

"That's bullshit," said Vince vehemently, "No one falls in love with people they hook up with at parties. You wake up, you find your clothes, you go home and never call them and they never call you. Those are the rules!"

"You're absolutely right Vince. We should write a letter to Disney immediately and tell them that they're perpetuating a falsehood about the 'rules' as regards classic fairy tales," Howard said with a sarcastic wave of his hand

"Don't get shirty with me. I'd rather marry my best mate who loved me rather than some pouf that fancied me for my shoes!" Vince snapped back

"Stories aren't supposed to be realistic, Vince. It's supposed to be an escape," Howard said quietly

"Haven't they seen 'When Harry Met Sally'?" Vince was patently sulking now. Howard sighed and pulled him closer and ruffled his hair.

"Here don't get upset, little man. It's only a story, yeah?"

"Yeah," Vince muttered against Howard's coat.

It was only forty five minutes later, when they were home and Howard was folding his clothes for the next day onto the end of his bed, that he remembered exactly what Vince had said.

iI'd marry my best mate who loved me rather than some pouf who fancied me for my shoes/i

He put his shirt down carefully and sat down on the bed. Had Vince meant that literally or was he talking about some hypothetical best mate that he'd marry. Who he'd imarry?!/i Howard decided suddenly that he didn't care if he looked like a fool and Vince teased him about this for a year. He walked towards the door quickly, gaining speed as he made his way to Vince's room.

He burst into the room and just as suddenly realised exactly how embarrassing this would be if he'd gotten it wrong. And how stupid it looks to burst into a room sheepishly. Vince was semi undressed and sitting on his bed.

"Took you long enough. I thought you were supposed to be the clever one?" he said casually but with a delicate tremor in his voice that was only just noticeable.

"So what now?" he asked plucking at his shirt in a way that was equal parts sultry and nervous fiddling.

"Vince I-" Howard coughed and blushed before looking up, "I think traditionally I would produce a white charger from somewhere and we'd ride off into the sunset"

"Nah, that's princes you're thinking of," smiled Vince, "you're my narky little butler who adores me from afar and then gives me up the second a jazzy village wench walks by"

"So what now?" Howard echoed Vince's earlier question, feeling slightly hurt by the reference to his birthday party.

Vince sashayed across the room until he was a foot away from Howard. He then shuffled closer until they were nose to nose (nose to chin to be completely accurate). He stood up onto his tippy toes and looked into his friend's eyes before pressing a gentle kiss against the corner of his mouth.

"Vince-" Vince shushed him and laced their fingers together before resting their foreheads together.

"Do you know what friends with benefits are Howard?" Oh shit, thought Howard. Vince continued without asking for an answer.

"We've been sort of married without benefits for ten years now." Hang on, what?

"I want to be with you. Just you. And ireally/i with you. You know?" Was Vince actually nervous? Howard wrapped his arms around Vince and kissed him firmly.

"Why me?" he asked incredulously?

"Because you love me and I love you. That's usually a good reason," Vince smirked cheekily.

"I'm not. I've never," Howard stammered, becoming increasingly aware of his friends erection pressing into his thigh.

"Don't worry, I'll fix that."


	3. Chapter 3

Howard shuffled anxiously while Vince's cocky grin flickered.

"We don't have to do anything you don't like," he said quietly, all traces of his earlier confidence gone.

"I do want to have done it. It's just doing it makes me feel a bit funny," Howard admitted.

How did it work anyway? He knew only the theoretical aspects of how to do it with a girl, was it different with men? Obviously it was different but, how different? Did Vince want to bum him? He had somewhat mixed feelings about that and he had been sure that his feelings on being bummed had been clear and to the point yesterday.

Not that he thought of it much. Hardly ever. It was scarcely his fault that Vince insisted on wearing those tight trousers that left absolutely nothing to the imagination. Which unfortunately only made his imagination competitive. It was impossible to look at him and not wonder what being fucked like him would be like. It would be like going to a race track and ignoring the cars.

Vince's face froze slightly. Howard realised his mistake.

"Just take it slow. I'm new to all this," he said sheepishly. This made Vince smile again, though more affectionately condescending than arrogantly this time.

"Nice and slow," he agreed and pulled Howard into a gut wrenchingly slow, sensuous kiss.

Their lips slid across each other in a lazy fight for dominance. Howard captured Vince's tongue in his mouth and gave it an experimental suck. Vince groaned and muttered, "Oh Howard" into his mouth. Not with the intonation that those words usually received either, like he was a puppy that had shamed itself in the middle of the kitchen floor. No, this "Oh Howard" was a creature far removed from the "Oh Howard" of old. This "Oh Howard" was doing something very, very right.

Emboldened by this success he nipped at his friend's lower lip and teased it between his teeth. That went down quite well, with Vince making a small noise in the back of his throat and pressing himself closer to Howard's body and pulling their hips together suddenly. They were both hard and straining against their flies. Howard yelped girlishly and jumped at the pressure causing Vince to break away and look up worriedly,

"Too fast," he asked nervously

"No, no just right," Howard said breathlessly. Vince flashed an impish grin before cupping the bulge in the taller man's trousers and _squeezing_.

"Too much!" Howard squeaked.

"Seriously?" Vince asked, "Sorry. Maybe we should lie down for a bit"

"Ho ho, Vince. I'm not that bad," snapped Howard. Vince waved his hands hurriedly

"No, no. Look like this," he said, grabbing Howard's hands and lying back on the bed, pulling Howard on top of him.

He spread his legs and settled Howard between them before grinding upwards with his hips. He guided Howard's hand above their heads before wrapping his arms around his neck.

"That good?" he asked sounding a bit winded.

"Aren't I too heavy?" Howard asked concerned

"Naw, I'm not made of glass. If Naboo can support a fully grown primate, I think you n' me'll manage."

Howard looked as though he was going to ask for an elaboration on what Vince had just said but, he soon forgot everything about tiny shamen and what they got up to on business trips with their familiars, when he felt Vince's sharp incisors against his jugular vein. It felt very nice and then very painful. For about ten seconds he was sure Vince was actually the vampire of Shoreditch and had seduced him so he could drink of his virgin's blood. Or something like that. And then he got used to the pain and wet suction and it was very, very nice again.

Vince might be mistaken for a women with startling frequency, but from this position there was no denying that he was a man. His stubbly cheek was scraping the delicate skin on Howard's neck, there was a taut if spare manly musculature writhing underneath his body and if any doubt could still remain on the topic, the hard cock digging into Howard's groin put it firmly to rest.

Abandoning the neck, the thinner man kissed up the whiskery jaw and nibbled at a fleshy ear lobe.

"We're going to have to lose the clothes, Howard. That bloody corduroy monstrosity is a mood killer if I ever saw one," Vince muttered, a wet explosion in the shell of Howard's ear.

Without asking permission he instantly got to work on the practical belt buckle that was responsible for the restraint of said corduroys.

"And the less said about the shirt the better," he went on, his voice was shaking slightly from the effort of unfastening the buckle.

Rather than throw a strop, Howard decided to concede this sartorial victory to Vince and started to unbutton his shirt, blunt fingers fumbling with the tiny buttons. Two warm little white hands batted his away impatiently and wrenched the garment off, sending the buttons flying in every direction.

"I've wanted to do that for years," Vince said with a voice husky with lust.

Howard toyed with the idea of asking him if he meant destroy his shirt or ravage him but decided neither answer would be totally satisfying. It was better to retain some degree of mystery in a relationship. Vince wiggled out from underneath him and started undressing. There was no question of helping him. True love or not, no one manhandled Vince's wardrobe.

Suddenly Vince was completely naked and Howard was down to his socks and underpants. Vince smiled at him ironically and went down on one knee taking one of Howard's feet in his hands. He hooked his fingers around the elastic and eased the sock down the foot , pausing to kiss the Achilles heel, the instep, the ankle. When the sock fell to the ground he gently sucked each of Howard's toes in turn like tiny fat phalluses. Howard was thinking in a small part of his mind that he was glad that he'd washed and cut his toenails recently. The rest of him was not thinking much at all.

When Vince released the big toe with an audible pop, he kissed his way back up Howard's leg, rubbing his cheek against his inner thighs like a pet cat and licking and nipping gently upwards. Howard held onto his shoulders, more to ground himself than to try to control Vince, and whimpered. Vince's face was in the hallow where his thighs met and his breath was coming in warm gusts that Howard felt through his pants. There was a slim hand on his stomach with a dexterous thumb stroking above the top of his undergarments. No matter how he tried to angle hips, that thumb stayed where it was.

"Please, Vince," Howard begged pitifully

"Please what?" asked Vince with faux innocence, "Tell me what you want"

"Want you," Howard gasped

"I'm right here. Tell me what to do," Vince stroked, stroked, stroked. Please _there! _

"I don't know but do it soon, please!" Please, please, please.

"Howard-"

"Please touch me!" Oh god, that was embarrassing. Howard tried to look away, but couldn't escape Vince's smiling eyes.

"As you wish," he said and pulled off the underpants in one smooth motion, pausing only for Howard to raise his hips.

He moved fluidly, taking the head of Howard's purpling cock in his mouth, pumping the shaft with one hand and cupping his testicles with the other. Howard watched the dark head bob between his legs with astonished fascination. Then, Vince looked up and the sight of his engorged penis slipping in and out of that familiar mouth was almost too much.

"Stop, too much," he gasped.

Vince stopped and looked up.

"Are you freaking out up there?" he asked, "Do you need to stop, stop?"

"No, not that. I just don't want to, you know, not yet," he looked away blushing.

You would think that it would get easier to say these things to someone who had been moments ago sucking you off. Apparently not.

"Alright," said Vince hoisting himself up and slithering up Howard's torso like a snake or a professional slitherer.

"Can I still kiss you, or is that weird after what I just did," he asked two inches from Howard's face.

Howard grabbed him by the back of his neck and tasted his own precome on those sweet lips. Salty, but not as bad as he thought it would taste. Vince smiled against his lips and opened his mouth hungrily. He began to rock and grind against Howard, who tentatively bucked back. They found a rhythm and ground against each other, erections digging into hips, lips on necks, ears, noses. Howard reached between their heaving bodies and grabbed their cocks together in his large hand.

"Wank me off, Howard," Vince whispered in his ear urgently.

Cock against cock, they both fucked Howard's tight fist desperately. Howard felt a tell tale tingle in his lower belly spreading downwards rapidly. He let go of the cocks and gripped his friend's shoulders.

"Vince, I'm going to- I'm, I'm," overcome with sensation and modesty he hid his face in the crook of Vince's shoulder and bit down on the tendon.

"I'm going to too," Vince said and screwed up his face before they came moments apart.

The electro boy collapsed bonelessly on top of his jazz maverick.

"That was really good," he said into the pillow.

"Really? I mean I thought it was but you've had more-" Howard spluttered slightly hysterically

"Howard," Vince turned his face off of the pillow, "You're the best"

"Don't mock me," Howard scowled.

"I mean it. And now I know you've been holding out on me, I'm never ever letting you go," Vince snuggled closer limpet-like hooking his legs around Howard's.

"Do you really mean that. You're not toying with me?"

"Well it was a bit of a lie," Vince said thoughtfully, "I'd still never let you go even if you were rubbish and I had to teach you everything. Go to sleep."

"I would but I've got a disenfranchised princess on me," Howard said and tickled Vince playfully.

"Gerroff you northern idiot." Vince squealed and rolled off and to the side of Howard, where he latched onto him again and hummed contentedly.

They lay twined together sticky and naked until the next morning when a surprisingly nonchalant Naboo casually informed them that shops didn't open themselves and would they mind terribly to take a moment out of their busy schedule to do their bloody job before they were out on their ears.

"Yes stepmother," groaned Vince reluctantly detaching himself from his new lover.


End file.
